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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27774784">Merry Christmas, Mr Barrow</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/irrationalgame/pseuds/irrationalgame'>irrationalgame</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Thommy Xmas Prompts [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Downton Abbey</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Christmas, Fluff, M/M, Thomas Barrow Xmas 2020, xmas</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 23:48:05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,142</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27774784</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/irrationalgame/pseuds/irrationalgame</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Jimmy is determined to give Thomas a merry Christmas, no matter what it takes.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Thomas Barrow/Jimmy Kent</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Thommy Xmas Prompts [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2031865</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>52</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>A Very Thomas Barrow Christmas 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Merry Christmas, Mr Barrow</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>For prompt 1: Merry Christmas - “Merry Christmas!” “It’s the first of December.” “I said ‘Merry Christmas’!”</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>December broke over Downton like an icy wave; the grounds covered in a thin blanket of frozen snow, the bare trees that lined the drive like broken-backed old men trying to twist out of the frigid wind, long icicles hanging from any bit of roofing they could find a footing in. Jimmy gazed out of his condensation-covered window and beamed at the Christmas card-perfect landscape.</p><p>He busied himself with the process of getting dressed, a smile on his face. It was almost Christmas, and, for the first time since his parents had died, he was looking forward to it. Having someone who actually cared if he was alive made the whole season so much more fun. Having someone he cared about in return was a new experience, but Jimmy hoped to make it a good one.</p><p>Of course, he couldn’t be too obvious about it. He hadn’t actually decided what to do about his <em>affection </em>for Thomas but - well, maybe it was just his festive spirit but he felt like if there was ever a time to declare your love for someone, it was at Christmas.</p><p>Livery on and hair perfect, he headed down for breakfast, stopping in at the kitchen to see if Thomas was loitering around like he sometimes did when he was cold, warming his injured hand over the stove.</p><p>“Merry Christmas!” Jimmy said to the kitchen at large, bouncing on the balls of his feet with excitement.</p><p>Ivy didn’t even look up from her chopping and Daisy just glared at him, elbow deep in a chicken.</p><p>“It’s the first of December,” Mrs Patmore said, “it’s not Christmas for <em>you</em> until the twenty-fifth.” She handed him a plate of toast and ushered him towards the servants hall. “Now get your jolly little self in gear and do something useful for a change.”</p><p>He pouted but did as he’d been asked - he’d learned after a couple of whacks with her wooden spoon that it wasn’t worth riling the cook - and plonked the toast on the servant’s hall table. Anna, Bates, Alfred and a few others were already gathered for breakfast.</p><p>“Merry Christmas!” he said cheerfully.</p><p>All eyes turned to look at him as if he’d grown a second head.</p><p>“It’s the first of December,” Mr Bates frowned, “and it’s seven in the morning. Tone it down would you?”</p><p>Everyone returned to sipping their tea miserably.</p><p>Jimmy was going to sit down, browbeaten into silence, until he realised Mr Barrow was missing.</p><p>“Where’s Mr Barrow?” he asked, trying to sound more nonchalant than he felt. It was like every time he thought of Thomas or said his name he fell a little deeper into the pit of yearning he’d found himself unwillingly cast headfirst into.</p><p>“In the yard, I think,” Anna replied with a knowing little smile.</p><p>“In this weather?” Jimmy frowned, “he’ll catch his death.”</p><p>“Chance would be a fine thing,” Bates muttered and Jimmy shot him his most horrible look.</p><p>“I daresay he feels the same about you, you miserable old cripple,” Jimmy muttered back, then scarpered before Bates had a chance to reply.</p><p>Sure enough, Thomas was in the yard, leaning against the wall and staring up at the grey sky; the clouds were almost low enough to touch and threatened more snow. Jimmy picked his way across the slushy yard and slotted himself in next to the under butler.</p><p>“Merry Christmas!” Jimmy said brightly, determined to continue in the good cheer the season demanded, despite everyone’s best efforts to ruin his high spirits.</p><p>“It’s the first of December,” Thomas drawled, a curl of smoke hanging in the damp air around him.</p><p>“I said ‘Merry Christmas’ Mr Barrow,” Jimmy pressed, and stole the cigarette from between Thomas’s lips and held it ransom.</p><p>Thomas sighed; “I don’t know what you’re so excited about. It’s not like it makes a jot of difference to us lot downstairs. Just means more work if anything.”</p><p>“Doesn’t matter,” Jimmy stole a drag on the cig before handing it back, “It’s Christmas, Mr Barrow. Everything is nicer at Christmas.”</p><p>“Is it?” Thomas said blankly. “I don’t see how.”</p><p>Jimmy bumped his shoulder against the under-butler’s. “Season of goodwill and all that.”</p><p>“I don’t have any <em>good</em> will left, I’m afraid.”</p><p>Jimmy gave him a concerned look.</p><p>Thomas sighed and chucked his cig into the slush. “What’s there to be merry about when you’ve got nothing and no one?” He looked away, likely embarrassed that he’d shared something so personal.</p><p>Jimmy’s heart felt as if someone had ripped it out and stomped it into the snowy ground. “Thomas,” he said, a hand on the under-butler’s shoulder. “You’ve got me.”</p><p>Thomas gave him a sceptical sort of look, his grey eyes like a thawing pond.</p><p>“I uh - well,” Thomas cleared his throat and gave a faint smile.</p><p>“I mean it,” Jimmy said. “An’ I’m going to make sure you have a merry Christmas if it’s the last thing I do.”</p><p>Thomas frowned; “If you carry on at this rate, it bloody well <em>might</em> be the last thing you do.”</p><p>Jimmy laughed. “It’ll be fun, I promise.”</p><p>“I doubt it.”</p><p>Jimmy poked Thomas’s chest with one finger. “Listen you, I’ve had shite Christmas after shite Christmas for the last, oh, five years? I’m going to make this one jolly and merry and sparkling with the light of a million candles if it bloody kills me, alright?”</p><p>Thomas blinked then nodded. “I feel like I’m going to live to regret this but - alright.”</p><p>Jimmy may or may not have punched the air in triumph.</p><p>The next twenty-three days were spent trying to make Christmas magical by, in no particular order: having snowball fights (in which the local kids battered Thomas and Jimmy to smithereens); making a snowman (which was promptly pissed on by a stray dog); sledging (Jimmy lost his hat and twisted his arm); ice skating (Jimmy lost his balance and twisted his arm); carolling (Jimmy lost Thomas that time, and found him in the pub); and visiting the winter fayre (Jimmy lost a lot of money and his dignity trying to win at the games).</p><p>He’d tried so hard to make Christmas wonderful - to make Thomas happy - but it had been a complete and utter unmitigated disaster. By the time Christmas Eve rolled around in a flurry of fresh snow and merriment, Jimmy was thoroughly miserable. He sat at the servant’s hall table, his head in his hands, close to crying.</p><p>Of course, typically, everyone else had found their Christmas spirit and were having a merry old time. They’d even been allowed to borrow the gramophone to play carols on - Molesley and Baxter were waltzing around the room to some soppy song and he sort of wished they’d trip over or something.</p><p>He sighed, resigned to another terrible, miserable, lonely Christmas for himself and Mr Barrow, when he felt someone nudge his elbow. Thomas.</p><p>“Come out for a smoke why don’t you?” Thomas smiled.</p><p>“Don’t feel like it,” Jimmy moped, “It’s cold.”</p><p>Thomas looked put out. “Go on, I’ve got something to show you.”</p><p>Curiosity got the better of him and Jimmy followed Thomas outside - the little courtyard was lit by half a dozen candles, their light reflecting prettily off the snow like a million stars. The bench had been cleared of ice and spread with an old tablecloth and blankets - there were two mugs of something steaming on the tabletop, and a neatly-wrapped little gift with a green bow lay beside them.</p><p>“Did you do all this?” Jimmy asked, taken aback by the sentiment.</p><p>“No, a bleedin’ elf flew down from the North Pole and did it,” Thomas said, “what do you think?”</p><p>Jimmy grinned; Thomas, his Thomas had done all this for him. “I think it’s lovely,” he replied.</p><p>“Well, good,” Thomas said. “Now come and drink your hot chocolate before it gets cold.”</p><p>They sat side-by-side on the bench, pressed together for warmth, and sipped hot chocolate, the sound of carols drifting out from the servant’s hall. Jimmy kept eying the gift and sighing until Thomas said; “Oh just open it, will you?”</p><p>Jimmy ripped off the paper like an excited child to reveal a small cardboard box, the sort you’d get with something precious inside from at the jewellers; inside was an exquisite open-faced silver pocket-watch on a delicate chain. Jimmy couldn’t quite believe it - it must’ve been very expensive and was far too nice for the likes of him.</p><p>“Thomas,” he breathed, holding the watch up to the flickering light of a candle, “it’s wonderful.” Then, not really meaning it; “I can’t accept it - it’s too much.”</p><p>“You can and you will,” Thomas replied. “You deserve to have a nice Christmas for a change.”</p><p>“Well,” Jimmy said, “this one is pretty perfect now.” He chucked the box and paper to one side and attached the watch to his waistcoat with a smile. “Now I’m smart enough to be an under-butler an’ all. You better watch out Mr Barrow.”</p><p>“I’m not very worried, I must admit,” Thomas smirked, “you’re about as collected and graceful as a duck on a frozen pond.”</p><p>Jimmy choked on the last of his hot chocolate. “Excuse me?”</p><p>“Well, if the snowball fight, sledging and ice-skating were anything to go by.”</p><p>“Ice is slippery!” Jimmy protested. “I’m fine on <em>normal</em> ground.”</p><p>Thomas just smirked, unconvinced.</p><p>“Fine, I’ll show you,” Jimmy said, jumping up. “Come here.</p><p>“Why?”</p><p>“Because I’m going to prove I’m just as poised and graceful as you.”</p><p>“You think I’m poised and graceful?”</p><p>“That’s not the point. Just get up here.”</p><p>Thomas gave a long-suffering sigh but acquiesced. As soon as he was close enough Jimmy took Thomas’s hand and pulled him in, chest to chest.</p><p>“Jimmy?” Thomas stuttered, “What are we doing?”</p><p>“Dancin’?” Jimmy replied, his tone insinuating that Thomas was being obtuse. “We are going to dance now and I’m going to lead and you’re going to bloody shut up about it and let me, alright?”</p><p>Thomas nodded, his cheeks tinged pink from either cold or embarrassment or both.</p><p>“Let’s just say this is my Christmas gift to you,” Jimmy added, and he started to waltz them around the courtyard.</p><p>“Does that mean you haven’t got me an <em>actual</em> gift?” Thomas replied - he was looking somewhere over Jimmy’s shoulder, his hair flopping over one eye.</p><p>“Oh <em>shut it</em>,” Jimmy huffed.</p><p>They both fell quiet and continued their slow shuffle around the yard - Thomas was tense under Jimmy’s hands, his jaw tight.</p><p>“Thomas,” he said softly, “relax will ya? It’s like tryin’ to dance with a marionette.” And he pulled their bodies together, his hand at Thomas’s waist. Thomas gasped a little but didn’t resist.</p><p>“Thanks,” Thomas said, his lips close enough that Jimmy could feel it against his ear, “for forcing me to have fun. I did enjoy myself, even if it didn’t seem like it.”</p><p>“You did?” Jimmy pulled back to gaze at Thomas. “I thought it had all been a <em>disaster</em>.”</p><p>“Oh it was,” Thomas smirked, “but it was funny watching you make a right mess of everything.”</p><p>“Oi,” Jimmy said and deliberately stepped on Thomas’s toe.</p><p>Thomas laughed then, a real, proper laugh and Jimmy couldn’t help but join in.</p><p>“It was nice though,” Thomas said quietly, “all the effort you went to. I ah - no one has ever done something like that for me before.”</p><p>“Just thought you deserved a bit of fun,” Jimmy said. It was all getting a bit serious, so he spun them around and around until Thomas was laughing again and they both ended up in a dizzy heap pushed up against the wall.</p><p>Thomas was smiling still, his eyes crinkled with happiness and Jimmy’s heart stopped for a moment before starting up a staccato rhythm in his chest. He let his fingers trail up from Thomas’s hip until he was cupping one ice-cold cheek. “You’re freezing y’know,” he managed to say.</p><p>“I actually feel quite <em>warm</em>,” Thomas replied, and Jimmy could hear the hope in his voice. It was the last push he needed. He leaned in and pressed his lips against Thomas’s for a second, before drawing back, his cheeks hot.</p><p>Thomas stared at him for a beat then reached out, his long fingers brushing a strand of hair back from Jimmy’s brow.</p><p>Jimmy leaned up and kissed Thomas again, pressing the under-butler into the wall with the intensity of it. Thomas’s mouth opened for him and Jimmy slipped his tongue inside, all heat and wetness, and when Thomas moaned he felt like all his christmases had come at once.</p><p>“I told you it’d be a merry Christmas, Mr Barrow,” Jimmy breathed when they eventually broke apart.</p><p>“I think it might just be the best one ever,” Thomas replied.</p><p>They kissed again beneath the stars, and for once everything was right in the world.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Unbeta’d and so many mistakes! I’ve edited like a billion times idk man</p></blockquote></div></div>
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